ABSTRACT
Switzerland is a country with four national languages: German (spoken by 63.6 per cent of the population), French (19.2 per cent), Italian (7.6 per cent) and Rhaeto-Romanic (0.6 per cent). The three larger linguistic areas look culturally to the neighbouring countries with the same language, so that the main reading matter of children and young people in Switzerland consists of what is available in these countries: Germany and Austria, France, and Italy. Native Swiss writing of children's books is found only in Francophone and German-speaking Switzerland, and most particularly when foreign texts do not meet the expectations of the Swiss public or cover subjects in demand.
